


Death’s Companion

by BogWithoutBodies



Category: Original Work
Genre: Can be read as queer platonic, Dark Fairy Tale Elements, Death is a women, Everyone is Dead, LGBTQ Character, Oldest daughter syndrome, Other, Rhiannon ate bugz, all my friends are dead, and life, deaths horse stares into the camera like it’s the office, so is fate, sorry this is a sad one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:55:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29544795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BogWithoutBodies/pseuds/BogWithoutBodies
Summary: Ravens weren’t always omens of death. No that came after they got their revenge.
Relationships: Original Female Character & Original Female Character, Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s)





	Death’s Companion

**Author's Note:**

> The second story I told my little sisters, at that point it was more of a myth or fable, “Do you know why Ravens are associate with death?” I asked them. 
> 
> Anyways, there is a lot of death in this, so far warning.

Past the tallest mountains, in the shadows of their might, lives a small Queendom long since forgotten. Here in the darkest part of this shadowed land is a small village hidden in far rolling hills, known as “The Land Death Forgot.” For here the people lived long lives, rarely stolen away by the reaper. The village was the envy of all others. 

But one year it seemed their good fortune abandoned them. A plague had struck their village, entrapping the youngest and eldest of them in raging fever. They would awaken from their fever dreams unable to breathe, coughing up blood as the struggled to force air in, as if their lungs were nonexistent. Thoses who were struck never seemed to last long. Their families would find them, cold and blue, choking to death on their blood. It was a mercy when they passed into Death´s peaceful grasp. 

The sickness was ruthless. It held no qualms on who it claimed. Soon their once bountiful fields turned into forests of dry hardened earth and wooden grave markers. A grim tally of their quicky falling numbers. There was seemly no escape; It would come for them all.

The remaining elders called forth a village meeting, since half of the village had fallen into the grasp of the illness and now they are but names whispered to the wind. The Elders, although reluctant, knew that they must find help before the rest of their village fell too. See, as the village´s name would suggest, they have never encountered something as devastating as this before, and thusly they have no need for a healer. Meaning one of their own would venture out past the sanctuary of the foggy hills, and into the neighboring villages to find a healer if they were to have any hope of surviving. 

The Elders stated as such to the gathered crowd of survivors. From fearful crowd stepped forward a young lady, Ideen Ravenwood, eldest child of the Ravenwood Family. With her head held high and proud, so much unlike her normally soft spoken and shy demeanor.

She proclaimed that she would go. No one even fathom disagreeing, they all knew that her treasured little brother had fallen ill, she would do anything for him, if he asked, she would pull down a star from the sky. 

The villagers came together to gather what little previsions they could spare to pack Ideen a small bag of supplies, it was not a lot but it would have to suffice. After she said her goodbyes to her parents, and with a final kiss to her brothers forehead, she accepted the small satchel, and set out.

She rode for three days and a night, searching for anyone who could help, but at every town she stopped at she was turned away. She left each town, eyes full of tears, listening to their laughter, as they call out their elations that her village´s unjust luck was running out.  
Just as the sun was setting on the third day, Ideen saw thick plumes of smoke rising above the hills, turing the sun a bloody red with its heavy haze. The smoke was coming from her village. Ideen had never ridden faster than she did that night. 

She reached her home just as the red sun was peaking over the hilltops. Dismounting her stead, she collapsed. 

She laid in the smoldering, charred wood, pieces of what had been her home once, eyes focused on the gruesome sight in the center of the still burning bonfire of her village. Heaps of bloody corpses, spattered the trampled ground, friends, family, neighbors, all laid mutilated, and lifeless before her. From under the mound, a small bloodcaked hand peaked out, clutching a small wooden doll, the very one Ideen had given to Rhys. The remaining glimmer of hope Ideen had kept alive, died the moment she clutched his hand. It was cold. Cold and pale. It laid there limp between her palms, but still Ideen held on, wishing that he would squeeze her hand back, and prove that this was just a dream, that they were still alive somewhere, somehow. 

She stayed there, bowed over, unaware to the passage of time, a figure of devotion worshiping at a temple crafted of sin. Ashes were slowly raining down, painting her rich brown skin a muted mask of grey, like that of the fog that clouded her mind. Forbidding her from accepting the reality around her. 

Snap. 

Someone was there. Standing right behind her.  


¨Do not weep for the dead Ideen, for it is the dead who weep for the living.¨ Their voice was rhythmic and haunting in away one would only expect of an old medicine lady, alive beyond her years but still clinging to her memories of the past, as she speaks of her youth as though it never left her. It both caressed and grated against her ears, unable to settle, like a water and oil mix, it was obvious that these words not not meant for a mortal´s ears.

¨Wh-¨ she tried to speak, startled by the intrusion into her grief filled solitude, but the heat of the flames had dried out her throat, only allowing a dry croak to slip out. 

¨Hush, beloved, I mean thou no harm.¨

Turning around, Ideen was enthralled, the women before her embodied the very word ethereal. 

She remembered the old tale her mother told her about the Three Sisters, the goddesses of the land, before the empire outlawed their worship, (not that her mother ever listened):

From nothing the first sister was born,  
The end of all she claimed her own,  
Second was the sister born of light,  
The start of all she claimed,  
The third sister was born of both,  
For she spun the threads off all

This woman was the first sister, she knew that this was true, It was the way the light seem disappear around her, the hum in her bones, and the silence that encased them. 

This was Death. 

¨M-my L-la-dy,¨ Ideen came out dry and brittle, barley audible.

¨Shh,¨ reaching out Death rested her hand on Ideen´s throat, and soothed away the burn, ¨I am so sorry Beloved, so so sorry. If I could have stopped them, I would have, but sadly I can only accept those who enter my grasp. I can not reach out to grab them. Only my sister, Fate, could have stoped them, if she were to chose to do so. Even then, there are rules she must follow.¨

¨You know who killed them? Who killed Rhys?¨ she took a deep breath and quietly asked, ¨Who killed them? Who killed him?¨

¨Please, I need to know..¨

Death slid her hand up against Ideen´s cheek, ¨I shall offer you this, beloved: give yourself to me, completely, offer me your soul, and I shall give you your revenge. When their time comes, it shall be you who collects them, and they shall be yours.¨

¨But… What do you get- why help me?” came the broken whisper from Ideen. 

Death simply smiled, a soft, sad smile, ¨I have been watching you for a very long time beloved. I watched you grow, I saw your love for your brother, much like mine for my sisters.¨ Death paused, ¨You and your mother were the last of my worshippers. For that I cherished you.¨

Sobbing, Ideen thought back on all those quite moments with her mother, the stories she had told her, the ¨family traditions” her mother made sure she knew by heart. Memories spiraled.

The day her father taught her how to ride her horse, the very same one she rode today,

Her mothers pies,

The rare warm summer nights spent chasing the last of the suns rays,

The nights under the stars with Rhys.

Rhys.

She remembered the day he was born, her mother had handed her a small bundle, and told her that he was hers to protect. It was that day, she gave her heart to him. 

But now he was dead. They all where dead. Killed. Murdered in cold blood.

Her tears dried. And the cinders in her heart grew to fames and with vengeance burning in her heart, and eyes, Ideen meet Death´s eyes. Death nodded, like she had expect the answer she received. 

She pulled her to stand, not caring about her weakened limbs. Still holding tight to her hand, Death pulled her patchwork cloak up and over Ideens head in a mesmerizing swirl of dark and light. At the end of its tunel of confusing coffinny of fabric Ideen was no more, in her place rested a black bird in the palm of Death outstretched had. 

Raising her hand close to her face Death spoke in a quite, sweet tone, like that of one lover to another, ¨Fly now Beloved, rise far above the ashes of the past, free your self of there pain, for now it is you who will bring it them. Fly Ideen.¨

And fly she did. Death watched her come into her wings for a moment before she turned to the mare behind her. She gently stroked her nose, and murmured, ¨ You did good Arwyn, you did good.¨ 

Arwyn snorted and tossed her head to gester up at the twirling black feathers. 

¨Oh shush, This was the best path for her, all other strings were frayed and rotten. Hardship lay ahead and behind for her, but this string weaves the most fruitful cloth.¨

Death fell silent, seeming to savor the quite moments of peace, even if it was tainted by the horror around them. With a soft sigh, she mounted Arwyn, and then turned her head skywards, ¨Come Beloved, it is time.¨

The whirlwind of feathers above slowed and circled around them. A mummer of ¨Ride Arwyn,” in to the mares ear they set out for places beyond the sorrow of flames. 

A blood chilling cry, one that promised pain and suffering to those that wronged her, one that they could feel in their very souls, the raven trailed after Death and her pale stead.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, that one kinda hurt. If anyone is confused on Ideen’s relationship with her parents, specifically her mother and brother, well all I can say is “Hi only child or younger sibling from a stable family!”  
> ‘Cause basically whole she does love her parents they basically shoved her younger brother at her for her to raise so they didn’t have to focus on raising him. 
> 
> So any ways, hope y’all enjoyed this one!


End file.
